Trying Some New Things (Patreon)

Gonna Try Some New Tactics

This is crossposted with my newletter

July was full of some good news and bad news.

The bad new was I didn't win the Eisner, which I'm honestly bummed about. My little brother who doesn't read comics or know about about them came to the ceremony to be supportive. So at least when I lost I have someone to pat me on the back and say I'll get em next time. Funny story though, we sat down for the ceremony and he turns to me and says "So who's this Will Eisner guy? And why's this award named after him?"

I have survived San Diego Comic Con. Well, I survive every year. I actually don't think San Diego Comic Con is that bad. A lot of other comics artists complain about it being too much, but I think New York Comic Con is worse personally. Not because of any fault of ReedPOP who runs it, but their convention center is in a worse local and has a worse layout. San Deigo Comic Con is also more fun cause I share my table with Jen Vaughn. 

The good new was Can I Pet Your Werewolf preprint Kickstarter did make goal. Mostly that was being of Spike. She put together a little ad/call for help in her newletter and the kickstarter made 8k in a day. So I owe her a big thanks. I got her a thank you present. We also went to this bar in San Diego called Werewolf. The picture up top is from the bar. I posted a few other pictures on my instagram. It was fun but kinda loud.

That Kickstarter and The Dead Deception one both took a lot out of me promo wise. So I'm taking a sorta break from twitter for awhile. I'd say I'm taking a full social media break, but I'll be honest, other social media's I use are just autoposts from my website saying there is a new comic/post. I got to think of a new way to engage with twitter that doesn't drain all my energy like a Sailor Moon villain. You might notice this is letter is longer on the what I've been up to info. That's because I'd think doing it all in a big chunk once a month might be easier for me. 

Other new stuff I'm trying out or prepping for is White Squirrel is gonna handle my store starting in September. I just don't want to walk to the post office anymore and while I try to go at least twice a month, that's become harder and harder to do on top of freelance. So I did a proper stock accounting for the first time in awhile. I apparently have 254 boxes of books, and 170 of those are Sorcery 101 because those books are so thick. 

I said last month that I'm restarting my Patreon more seriously. One of the things I want to try is something I saw Seanan McGuire do on her Patreon: tell you where the Patreon money is going. At the moment my patreon doesn't make a lot. So the stuff I'm getting with it is gonna be stuff that would make my life easier. Because it's not an emergency thing I tend to put these things off and off and off and off. 

So this month's Patreon funds are gonna go to getting me a new printer. My comic drawing process is I pencil digitally and then print my pencils out on 11 by 17 bristol to ink. Since 2010, I've used an epson photo 1400 for that. But last night I spent 3 hours trying fixing a problem where it didn't think the black or yellow ink was there. I succeeded but the question remains, for how long. So it might be time to get a new printer. I'm thinking about this one

It can be hard to find a printer that handles bristol but this is the one that most folks are telling me handles thicker paper well. At the moment my Patreon can't cover the whole thing, so this will probably be next months patreon purchase too. Unless someone wants to just buy it for me outright. 

Anyway, here's some posts from me in July you might have missed. There isn't a lot because of SDCC times

• Stone King Writer Notes part 4 went up. That's a wrap on all things Stone King. 
• Dirty Old Ladies, my podcast with Spike Trotman and Amanda Lafrenias did three episodes. One is about setting creative goals, the second is about learning for noncomics media, and the last is a listener question episode. 

Thanks everyone for reading!